Thread: County Commissioner Subject of Warrants

BEDFORD COUNTY, Tenn. - Three police warrants bearing the name Bobby Vannatta, a county commissioner, were still waiting to be served Saturday night, according to inside sources at the sheriff's department.

At sunset, two marked sheriff's department vehicles were at the Vannatta family farm on Unionville-Deason Road, in Deason, to retrieve some giant, heavy steel I-beams: precisely what was stolen earlier that morning from a farm property on Eady Road, also in Bedford County.

"Steel's at an all-time high," said Jim Smith, the landowner and theft victim. Smith was speculating about what might prompt a person to steal steel. Smith said he and sheriff's deputies caught the truckload of suspects red-handed. And the driver was, by all accounts, Bobby Vannatta.

"We simply took for granted that people was taking (steel) to re-sale for scrap metal," Smith continued.

Smith took NewsChannel 5 on a guided tour of the crime scene: the small, Binford Creek, near his in-laws' property; the site where he was just trying to build a bridge or two to in-load and off-load heavy, farm machinery in the field.

But those giant I-beams are not small, nor are they light, Smith admitted. They measure 14-feet long, he said, and weigh upwards of half-a-ton apiece.

Knowing that only reinforces Smith's theory that Vannatta had help. Smith said when sheriff's deputies caught up with Vannatta Saturday morning, behind the wheel and not far from the scene of the crime, that at least two much more able-bodied men had bailed from the pickup truck.

Bobby Vannatta, said to be in his 80's and not in the best health, is facing charges of: criminal trespass; theft of more than $500; and vandalism of more than $1,000. He did not return our phone calls at the house, nor did anyone answer knocks at the door.

Because Vannatta is not being arrested in a traditional manner, he will have 10 days to surrender to authorities once those three arrest warrants are successfully served.

http://www.newschannel5.com/story/15263 ... f-warrants

Might be worth checking his workforce for the able bodied men that ran from the truck?Vannatta Farms, Inc.

Bobby W. Vannatta

The Vannatta Farm, Inc., which is ten miles north of Shelbyville, is one of the few incorporated Century Farms. Established by James and Jerusha Clardy Vannatta in 1850, the farm initially contained 100 acres of land on which the founders grew wheat, cotton, and corn. They also managed a herd of cattle and their land was the site of the local post office.

Married twice, James Vannatta fathered ten children and his son George W. Vannatta became the farm’s second generation owner. George and his wife Fanny Swain raised five children. While George farmed the same amount of land and produced the same commodities as his father, he took advantage of the popularity of cotton in the late nineteenth century and “built and operated the first cotton gin in the 5th district,â€